Literature and biography
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University of Iowa Press
No matter how many letters, diaries, unpublished manuscripts, memoirs, photographs, and other sources are available to the biographer, omniscience is impossible and memories are faulty. Problems of construction also pose special challenges. Should the biography be a straight narrative or a psychological treatment? Where should it begin? How should it end? These matters and many others are covered in this important collection of nineteen new essays by eminent biographers.
The essays in The Literary Biography range from an examination of the traditional biographical form, which studies in detail the relation of a writer's art to his or her life, to psychobiography, which is guided more by psychological theory. The contributors explore with insight and candor the many ways they contend with a wide variety of materials, with ethical and legal and stylistic problems, and with what Victoria Glendinning calls the “lies and silences” in the public records.
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biography
What Is Biography? Definition, Usage, and Literary Examples
Biography Definition
A biography (BYE-og-ruh-fee) is a written account of one person’s life authored by another individ. A biography includes all pertinent details from the subject’s life, typically arranged in a chronological order. The word biography stems from the Latin biographia, which succinctly explains the word’s definition: bios = “life” + graphia = “write.”
Since the advent of the written word, historical writings have offered information about real people, but it wasn’t until the 18th century that biographies evolved into a separate literary genre. Autobiographies and memoirs fall under the broader biography genre, but they are distinct literary forms due to one key factor: the subjects themselves write these works. Biographies are popular source materials for documentaries, television shows, and motion pictures.
The History of
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A biography, commonly known as a bio, is defined as a detailed description of a person&#;s life. Rather than dealing with the basic facts of the subject&#;s life like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person&#;s experience with life events, presenting a subject&#;s life story, with highlights of various aspects of his or her life, including intimate details of experience, and may even include an analysis of the subject&#;s personality.
Biography&#;s are usually non-fiction in nature but fiction can sometimes be used to portray the subject&#;s life. One form of biographical coverage is called legacy writing that deals with in-depth research.
At first, biographical writings were merely a subsection of history focusing on a particular individual of historical importance. The independent genre of biography began emerging in the 18th century reaching its contemporary form at the turn of the 20th century. Biographical research as defined by Miller is a re